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Today in Irony: Karl Marx Book Sells for $40K!

PhilHaney

Nietzsche might have said that “God is dead” but no one can argue that irony is dead. The “father of communism,” nineteenth century German philosopher and economist Karl Marx just had a first edition copy of his 1867 book Das Kapital sell for $40,000. Sounds like the proletariat are going to be having a party tonight! Everyone make sure to share the vodka!

Marx would have loved internet humor, and also file sharing.

The reason this is awesomely ironic is that, as you might recall from 9th grade history class, his writings on socialism and class struggle including The Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital in part led to the establishment of the Marxist and Communist economic and political systems. In other words Marx is going for a spin in his grave right now since today one person has this much cash on hand to purchase a single book. His book!

USA! USA! USA!

Even if you aren’t a commie, you can appreciate the historical significance of the book as the reason that it fetched such a lofty price. It’s not the first time an old copy of Das Kapital got a little capitalism going on. In 2011 another rare copy sold for around $51 thousand dollars. Maybe Karl should have gone into publishing?